Chapter 21
Ambiguity
Kenny
I tap the corner of my desk as I continue to listen to the voice on the other end, wishing that it would be over and done with as soon as possible. But abruptly hanging up right now doesn't seem like the best idea...not unless I want an earful about it from Kyle later. I definitely cannot deal with his grumbling about how I'm a shitty friend and whatnot in my state of mind for this past week.
"Are you even listening?"
I sigh into the speaker end of the phone and switch ears. I check my watch and realize it's been twenty fucking minutes already. She wasted twenty minutes of my break with only ten minutes remaining. So much for a nice quiet lunch. Correction: so much for finishing my lunch since I haven't been able to touch what my wife made ever since she started chatting. Don't get me wrong, I'm an expert at talking with my mouth full or just listening while I eat. I should know since Kyle always bitches at me for lacking proper manners whenever I talk with a full mouth, but it's more like I lost my appetite today.
"Yeah..." I rub my eyelids and lean back on my chair a bit. But even with a ruined lunch break I can't just ignore someone who's crying at the other end of the line. Even if it is Wendy.
Basically for the past twenty minutes she has been crying about how Kyle's been distant lately. Like the way he keeps cancelling plans on her and refusing to go over to her place because he's busy with something, or how he doesn't really listen to her when she talks and even going as far as losing his patience if she asked him what was wrong. Truth be told, if Kyle says he's busy with something, it usually means he definitely IS busy with something. I know the guy, and he's usually telling the truth about stuff like that. It's just sad that his so-called girlfriend doesn't even know him well enough to realize that his job is a real pain in the ass when it comes to spare time. However, him being emotionally distant is another story.
I hear Wendy sniffle a couple of times before she takes another breath. "I just don't know what's going on." she says.
I don't say anything but let her cry to her heart's content.
For the whole week this was how my lunch went by each day. Talking on the phone with Wendy out of all people. And by talking on the phone I mean it mainly consists of her talking and me not knowing what to say. I would have nicely told her to bugger off and never call me again...but her tears. Every time she called and would be either near tears or is already crying. And even I can't just shut her out without a single thought. And I hate to admit that I'm beginning to grow accustomed to this daily routine of ours. She even dropped by the day before in the middle of the night because she couldn't sleep. I've heard of calling up friends in the middle of the night to talk about problems, but I've never heard of anyone driving all the way in from South Park just to talk about relationship problems. I even let her stay the night and had to lie to Kyle who couldn't reach her at her house that she had car troubles and needed a place to crash. Of course, right when Kyle called, her mood was suddenly lifted and she left almost immediately. But then it was the same problem again the next day, which brings us to where we are now. Maybe I'm just being soft because of her sorrow that I can't find the nerve to tell her off like I would do to most people, but I can't help thinking that maybe our increased contact this past week has somehow brought me back to the past.
Our past.
"Wendy, I don't have time to listen to this." I mumble into the phone even though I know that that won't do any good. It's more like a way for me to convince myself that just because she's crying, it doesn't change the way I feel about her presently. But I'm still human after all. No matter how much I hate someone, I just can't be my usual asshole self to them if they're in a pathetic state like this. But the question is, do I really hate her, and has the feeling I've been feeling for her all this time really been hate? That's the thing that has been on my mind all week ever since we increased contact with each other.
"I know. But thanks for listening." she says in between her sniffs but make no effort to hang up.
"Sure, whatever." I say back but also make no effort to hang up. If really hated her, then I would hang up on her, right? I'm starting to sound like Kyle.
I can feel her pain. The pain of not knowing what the hell's going on and the same pain that makes you doubt everything that you thought was true. I should know since that was the only thing I felt up until I met my wife. So I can't not feel for someone going through what I went through a long time ago, even if this particular someone was the cause of my past melancholy.
"I should go." she sniffles again and the phone goes dead, so I finally hang up.
Really. It this how my life at work going to be like from now on so long as Kyle doesn't address his fucking problem? Am I going to have to pay the price for Kyle's cowardice by having my past pains dug up and relived.
I sigh and close my eyes. I promised myself that I wouldn't interfere anymore with Kyle's life, but now that I'm being slowly dragged into this, I don't think I have much of a choice. This isn't just about Kyle anymore, this is about me and my life with the one I love. And I can't risk that for anything. This past week has been hell for me and I have a feeling it isn't going to end any time soon. Not unless Kyle makes up his fucking mind and not unless Wendy stops acting like the way I was.
"Goddamn it..." I mumble in my hands. I was hoping I wouldn't have to think about the past anymore. My wife and I have gone through so much to be happy the way we are today...but this situation with Kyle is fucking up our efforts. It's as though I keep telling myself that it's not my problem and that I'm just the good friend that will help Kyle get through this, but that isn't the case anymore. It's become a part of my problem through my association with Kyle.
This isn't fair.
I thought involving myself in this problem would help one of my best friends be happy. I just didn't think that doing something good would be such a hassle for myself. It's like one phrase that fatass Cartman always said to us whenever we thought about doing something good instead of causing trouble...what was it? 'No good deed goes unpunished?' Or something along those lines. The only reason I remembered that phrase was because that what exactly happened to Stan and I when we were hanging out with Kyle and Cartman that one time after school in ninth grade. I remember we found a wallet on the street when we were walking home and decided to drop it off at the police station instead of taking out all the money like Cartman suggested. Little did we know, the owner was also at the police station looking for his wallet and when we brought it in, he accused us of stealing it off of him in the first place.
"I told you assholes, no good deed goes unpunished." was what Cartman rubbed in our face for the next couple of weeks, making sure we felt like shit for trying to be "goody-goods," according to him.
Maybe it's because I haven't moved past it yet, but regardless, it's not something that I want hanging on me. No, not while I'm trying to have a future with my wife. I can't have the past affecting my future. If I leave it the way it is now, I'm afraid the past will destroy my life now and the life that I will have. I just can't let the past nourish itself through my present. I need to destroy my past with Wendy.
Our past.
Kyle
The number of people passing me in the mall is making me more and more anxious as my watch ticks away every second, telling me that it's getting closer to the time that Stan will arrive. Its slow and yet balanced ticking with equal intervals feels like it's mocking me for standing here looking like a complete loser, and for coming out on a secret hang out with Stan behind Wendy's back. Maybe I'm just nervous but I'm normally not like this when I'm nervous. When I'm nervous I feel more of a sense of dread; a sense of not wanting what I'm nervous about to happen. Like that time when Stan and Kenny got in trouble for finding that ugly wallet. I felt that dread right when that guy glared at them and immediately I started to dread that they would get accused for stealing. And when it happened, I started to wish it didn't happen in the first place. But right now, it's neither of those feelings. It's more comparable to the feeling I felt the day I saw Stan for the first time. The feeling I couldn't describe. That...surreal feeling.
I glace at my watch again. Right, checking my watch every twenty seconds isn't going to make Stan arrive any faster. Especially since I'm the one who arrived half an hour early to meet him. Only a dork would do that.
A couple of girls from my school stand across me and whisper to each other while throwing glances at me every now and then. Only an idiot wouldn't think that they're talking about me. Knowing the types of students in my school, it's probably going to be the talk among the hallways by the end of fifth period on Monday. Something along the lines of "Did you know Mr. Broflovski was at the mall on Saturday waiting in front of the giant fountain? Maybe he's on a date with a secret love!" or "Oh, did you see Mr. Broflovski standing in front of the fountain? Maybe he's piss poor and is waiting for everyone to leave so he can steal the pennies in there." Either way, I'll look bad because that's just what the students at my school are good at. If only they would put that much effort into their schoolwork then our school wouldn't have to show off its wealth and high-classiness to cover up the poor grades. Maybe then the school wouldn't have to take so much money out of the budget to glam up its social events. I wouldn't mind finally having some good cafeteria food for once.
One of the girls point and laugh at me and all I do is nod out of politeness for noticing them. They wave and then take their leave much to my relief. It was stupid of me to think that I wouldn't run into anyone from school at this mall. I mean come on Kyle, it's only the biggest and most popular mall in Denver, so of course your chance of running into anyone living in Denver would be next to zero. No Kyle, even though this mall contains the majority of shopping needs for the people you know in Denver, they would never in their freaking life ever think about shopping here because your chance of running into them is ZERO.
God fucking damn it.
I glance at my watch again. There's still about twenty minutes before Stan arrives so I should walk around for a bit to move my legs and to not look like a poor creeper who's waiting for his secret love and/or trying to steal the pennies out of the giant fountain. And if I'm lucky, I might be too tired from the walk to be nervous in front of Stan.
I walk into the bookstore and look around the various sections they have on display and find nothing particularly interesting. The typical romance novel and science fiction comic are nothing new to me. They have had the same selection of graphic novels for almost three years. I've read them all whenever I come here with Wendy and wait for her to go off to select her own books in peace since nothing she reads interests me. I just wish they would update their graphic novels. I'm just dying to know what happens to that blonde ninja after him and his best friend kick each other's ass and go their separate ways. Every time I come back to check on the updates I get disappointed because I wonder if it will be a happy ending for the two characters, even if that is a romanticized view on real life. But it doesn't hurt to daydream sometimes even if such an ending can only occur in fiction.
I walk out of the book a little disappointed that I still don't know the fate of the two friends in my favourite graphic novel after three years. Actually, I'm more disappointed because it feels like a sign that my future with Stan is just as ambiguous as that unfinished story that I still don't know the ending to. And just like that story, the control is out of my hands because I'll only know if the artist decides to continue that story or if the store decides to update with new volumes the same way as only time can tell me which way mine and Stan's relationship will go. Unfortunately, rushing things will probably render our relationship as bad as an artist rushing his/her work and ending up with messy plot holes in his/her story. And I don't want plot holes in my story.
I make my way around to the clothing store on the other side of the mall and catch my attention on a couple of those religious people trying to promote Christianity or something along those lines. It looks like they're badgering the shit out of...Stan?
I check my watch and realize that I was in the bookstore far longer than expected so I make my way over there to save the day.
"Would you like to attend our weekly gathering this weekend? You can reinforce your faith in Christ through this event." says one of the well dressed guys to Stan while the other one forces a bunch of brochures towards him.
Stan just fumbles around for a bit and tries to politely brush them off but fail to do so since they keep interrupting him. He never has been good with dealing with pressure from religious people even when he was younger. I guess that's another thing that hasn't changed.
"W-well...I..." Stan mumbles nervously again but the two men are just too into persuading Stan into coming to their event and attacking him with more brochures.
"Stan is there a problem?" I approach him and he looks as if he is about to cry after seeing me. The two men are also a bit startled that I interrupted their "talk" with Stan.
"Kyle-."
"Oh, are you a friend of his?" the one in the short brown hair cuts him off as they are quick to switch their attention from Stan to me. "We were just telling your friend Stanley here that-."
"Oh, sorry we don't have too much time for this." I try to reason.
"No, you have plenty of time. We really welcome you and Stanley here join us for this wondrous event." he shoves a brochure in my face. These guys are really hard to push off. No wonder why Stan always had such a hard time. I just want to know why he attracts these type of people so much.
"That's alright. We have somewhere we need to be." I try to reason again as I start to back up a bit.
"Oh, it can't be as important as our gathering with Christ is it?" the guy laughs obnoxiously. "Stanley here was just-."
"That's alright, we were just on our way to get married." I smile mischievously and tug on Stan's arm to move him forward. I've had it up to here with this guy calling Stan by his full name. Who the fuck does he think he is? "Come on, let's go...er...sweetie." I tug on Stan's sleeve again and we walk away.
As expected, the two guys back away without hesitation and politely make up some excuse that they had somewhere else to be. Much to our relief, they go off quite fast too. It's actually kind of funny.
"Married?" Stan asks while I pull him forward as quickly as possible in case those two decide to come back.
"Forget about that. More importantly, are YOU alright? You looked like you were about to keel over." I reply as I place emphasis on my voice to remind Stan of all the trouble he would get himself into whenever it involved religious people.
He looks away a bit embarrassed that he was actually bothered by two guys that were smaller and probably younger than he is."Ah...yeah. I never have been good at trying to ward off those creepy religious guys in public."
"I know." I smile as I face him and he grins at my remembrance. Rather bashfully too.
"And another important question, are we going to eat or what?" I ask and he suddenly remembers that we both haven't had lunch yet.
"That's right. Those guys actually made me forget about food for once." he laughs and we make our way to order our food. But the problem now is deciding where to order from because it seems like we bother have our eyes on different places.
We'll figure something out.
X
"Honestly, that food was as bad as our school's." Stan throws out his trash.
I'm not going to lie, the food we ordered was so disgusting that we had to trade lunches. But even that didn't help because we ended up hating each other's food even more. So in the end, we opted to buy a few snacks from the few stores around us that had nothing but junk food. Then again, having junk food is better than the crap we ordered any day.
"Hey, where do you want to go?" I pop a piece of gum in my mouth and offer Stan a piece but he declines.
"Hmm..." Stan looks around the mall. "I've never really been here before, so maybe you can show me around. It's huge." he smiles with wonder. "I mean the malls in New York are bigger, but they don't have some of the stores you guys have here."
Stan looks around and points at the store across from us. "Like that store. What do they sell there? It looks pretty racy."
"It's a sex shop."
Stan raises an eyebrow and looks at me awkwardly. "Maybe we should check other stores."
"Sure, want to check out that music store?" I pointed to a nearby store blaring one of Lady Gaga's new releases with her video flashing on the various T.V's hanging around the store. "They might have something you like. Maybe you can-."
"Is that Officer Barbrady?" Stan asks as he points to the floor below us at a rather tall and pudgy security guard that resembles said officer distinctly. I scratch my head as I try to remember him. Well, that explains why we haven't seen him in South Park for so many years. I guess Stan's not the only who left.
"No wonder why I haven't seen him." I shrug. "Oh well, come on Stan, let's go into the music store." I don't give Barbrady a second thought and remind Stan that there are more interesting things to do in a mall on a Saturday afternoon than stare at an overweight ex-cop from South Park. Perhaps that's what people do New York on Saturdays but it's not something that would I like to spend my weekend doing.
I'm suddenly yanked back as Stan pulls on my arm when I try to move forward. "Remember that game we used to play when we were little?" Stan asks with his gaze still fixed on Barbrady. I read into that look of both excitement and mischief in Stan's eyes. It is then I realize exactly what he is referring to.
The "Hide From the Cop Game."
Basically, when we were in middle school, we invented this new game to piss off the mall security guards. We would stalk out a guard in duty and then blow spit balls at them over the railing from the floor above. Then we would hide from them as they freaked out and looked around for the culprits who blew the many wet wads of paper at them. But that only happened rarely when we did managed to hit them from such a high distance. But when it did happen, it was the funny crap ever.
Stan pulled out a few tissues and started forming small balls after wetting them a bit with his spit.
"Stan, I don't think this is a good idea..." I warn him as I try to remind him how old we are and that this type of mischief will only embarrass us if we get caught. Imagine, two grown men getting caught for spit-balling a security guard at the mall. I wonder how well that will sit with me at school since the students there are likely to gossip about it like there's no tomorrow.
"I wasn't actually going to do it." he replies as he flicks the balled up tissue down below but it doesn't hit Barbrady or anyone for that matter. It just lands on the far away floor and will probably be stepped on by people walking around. "Besides," he continues. "I don't have a straw." he flicks another piece. "I just wanted to relive a happy memory with you, that's all." he laughs.
As we stand there gazing down from the railing, there's something about what Stan said that makes my eyes sting a bit. Maybe it's the memory of the good times, or maybe it's because of fact that we may never experience those happy memories the same way again, but...but...
"Kyle...?" Stan looks at me with distress and reaches out with the left over tissue and wipes my face.
"What? Is there something on my face or...?"
"You're crying." his voice softens as he dries off my skin.
"Oh..." I touch the side of my face and feel it's wetness; a wetness that won't stop. Yeah, why am I crying? Why out of all places, am I crying here in public with Stan next to me? I can't think right now since all of my sense are shut down. The only thing that I feel are Stan's strong arms around me, holding me while I let the tears flow down my face and soak into Stan's blue sweater.
It's strange, all it took was a simple reminder of a childhood game to render me into a crying mess. It's not like the game was so awful that it made me feel bad about tormenting those security guards at the mall, but it's more like I felt the possibility that we CAN return to those happy times together even if they won't be exactly the same. Rather, we'll somehow be happy again in a different way; a way that'll present itself as a different kind of relationship than what we had before. But the only question is, what kind of relationship will that be and where will it take us? Will we be happy just the way we are as distant friends? Close friends? Something else? Or a combination of the second and third choice?
I don't know.
I don't know.
I just don't fucking know.
This mystery makes the tears in my eyes flow down even faster than before. This damn ambiguity scares me so much that all I can do is cling to Stan for comfort. It's strange, he's the cause of this ambiguity and yet he's the only thing that can heal me; the only one that can sooth the hurt of this ambiguous rift between us; and most of all, he's the only that can stop the pain all together.
"Stan?" I mumble out as I try to pull out of his tight hold.
"What's the matter?" he loosens his hold on me and I finally pull my face out of his grasp.
"I couldn't breathe." I sniff a bit as I chuckle, embarrassed that he (and probably along with the rest of the people in the mall if they were paying attention) had to see a grown man crying in the arms of another grown man. Some things are better done in private, but I couldn't help myself. It just all came out.
"Sorry." he flushes a bit and looks away. "I get a little protective when someone close to me is hurt."
Okay, so I guess we're not distant friends then. That only leaves the second and third option.
"I know. You always were like that even back then." I smile all the while trying to compose myself. I feel like a complete wreck since I am and always have been the one who didn't let emotions get in the way of rational thinking except for the occasional outburst if something really struck a nerve. Letting my emotions slip out in public isn't the most logical thing in the world, but I guess today was one of those instances that hit a nerve for me. And I can see why it did.
"Hey Stan," I continue, seeing as how this is the best time to bring it up more than ever while we are in the mood. Who knows when an opportunity like this will come again. "you know you accidently kissed me last week, right?"
Stan's expression freezes as he looks away. The best I can describe it is an "oh shit" look on his face. I can't say that my expression did not freeze after looking at him because that means he probably remembers exactly what happened even if it seemed like he was so off to La-la land to even register his surrondings.
"Yeah...I did." he scratches the back of his head and leans forward on the railing. "Why?"
"No, it's nothing. I just thought you might want to know what happened in case you didn't remember." I mumble into my sleeve all the while drying off my damp face.
Stan simply nods and continues staring at Barbrday below us who is still not doing much besides standing there looking like a tool.
"Sorry..." he mumbles. "I really didn't mean to."
"Ah, no!" I protest because the last thing I want is for Stan to think I'm putting him on the spot for it. "Don't apologize. In fact," I add as my face heats up and I'll most likely regret saying this later. "it's wasn't that bad."
"Really?" Stan grins. "I guess that's why the girls were so crazy about me in high school. I'm still a good kisser even when unconscious."
"They're still crazy about you, you know." I say as I feel a bit of jealousy hit me after being reminded how the girls back then and now still drool over him. And I don't mean that I'm jealous OF him.
Stan chuckles at my reaction and then softens. "If only a certain person were that crazy over me, then I could care less if every woman in the world found me found me repulsive." he looks at me intensely with those deep blue eyes that my heart literally skips a beat. Even with that piercing look, I'm unable to look away. All I can do is stare and left myself be drawn in by them.
"W-what are you-?"
"Tell Wendy I'm sorry." Stan leans in and kisses me as he resumes his initial hold around my body when I was in tears.
Without thinking, I kiss back and leave my lips on his for as long as I can, not wanting to break it just yet. I don't care if children or the elderly are watching. Shit, I don't even care if kids from our school are watching. I just want to stay like this. I just want Stan to pull me out of reality and leave me like this for as long as he can. I just want...Stan.
Stan stops and tries to part but I place both my hands on his head and pull him back in again. This may not be a deep kiss, but I don't care. I just want contact. The warmth from the contact is more than enough to make me happy right now and I'll be damned if I let Stan get away just when I'm starting to enjoy it. But after this, I just know that I'll be wondering where this will takes us in our relationship. It'll be so much more confusing than before that I'll be constantly asking myself why did I not want to let Stan go? Why did I kiss him back when I'm with Wendy now? But more importantly...
...what are we now?